G.rim R.ealities I.nevitably M.ediating E.xistence
Rooftop Deck of Saxon Luxury Hotel; Las Vegas, Nevada
Day One
I’m already coming to grips with the fact that I’m gonna be trapped in this hotel for the better part of the next three weeks. I mean, it could be worse, right? I could be trapped at home, not working. I could be stuck on the streets where I would be more exposed to the virus. I could be laying six feet under the fucking dirt. Day One is the hardest because it is filled with uncertainties.
Am I gonna make it through this unknown amount of time, feeling like I’m stranded on a deserted island. Will my only friend be a volleyball with a face drawn on it? Am I gonna grow an old white man, Father Time kinda beard? Will I learn to sit in a totally isolated situation and become just a ticking time bomb of emotions? When it’s all over, will I know how to function like a human being?
Or will I fall to the drink and slowly lose my mind? Will I find the walls of this Timberline Lodge closing in on me? Will I start talking to shit that ain’t even there? Will my insanity build on a slow burn until I just fucking snap and take an ax to those surrounding me? “Herrrrrrre’s Javi!” All work and no play makes Javi a dull boy. Sometimes human places make inhuman monsters. “Wendy? Darling? Light, of my life. I'm not gonna hurt ya. I'm just going to bash your brains in.”
Nah… most likely I’ll just survive same as I always have, mang. It’s just gonna be all kinds of boring. I might be surrounded by SCU and SCW stars just as much as the GRIME guys, but ain’t nobody as grimey as me. Nobody that’s free anyway. The Monstimals stick to themselves and do… whatever it is they be doing. Esther and Andrey is always off, together at the hip. Or in between them hips. Hitamashii don’t like me. Hell, nobody likes me. But what can I say? It’s lonely at the top.
I never noticed this as much as when I stare off of this rooftop and out across the city that never sleeps, watching it sleep. Lights off, and ain’t nobody up. It’s a boring existence right now. High above everyone else. It reminded me of my time as the SCU Underground Champion. They ain’t even seen it coming. When I won the belt, it was like they all thought I was gonna fail. I was gonna drop it on my first defense. Then my second. Then my third and so on. Nobody expected me to make Stewart Mason look like a chump of a champ.
But when that higher calling came to me, I knew it was gonna be different. It was gonna not have to be me against the world no more. That was the pitch. I let out my inner self. I did what I wanted to do. Finally. I surrounded myself with people who wanted what we signed up for, an edgier wrestling product. We might be making that magic on the camera, but once it cuts off, we just go our own separate ways. And here I am, staring out over a sleeping city, all by myself. The one and only person that I can talk to and be real with is locked up in an insane asylum. That don’t look good on me, now does it?
I sit here and wonder how I could get in contact with her. I even raided the boiler room two weeks ago to take some dried up leaves from Le Coven. I took some candles and some salt. I followed what I seen from them and I draw a circle. I set up five candles and put them leaves in that little stone bowl thing and I set it on fire. It blows up a lot quicker than I thought it would and pieces fly into the wind.
The wind. It picked up. I musta done something right because it’s like a small tornado surrounding me. I read once that you can get better results when you offer a sacrifice of your own blood. I pull out my switch and I slice my hand just a little. I squeeze the blood into the bowl and everything gets misty and black. Like a cloud of bad shit comes my way. I suddenly smell something like rotten eggs filling my nostrils. I’m shocked and I can’t seem to move until the smoke clears. When it does, I’m sitting there alone.
Me: Well that was fucked up. Too bad it ain’t did nothing. Damn...
I wait a second to look around, but still don’t see nothing. I stand up from the circle and run my foot across the salt because I’m pissed off. I pick up the bowl thing and I throw it off the rooftop. I start cursing under my breath as I walk toward the door, because being inside in this luxury hotel has got to be better than smelling eggs up on the roof. But wait. That smell might be… her. I feel like someone is holding onto my shoulder and I turn around with hope deep down in my chest.
What I see is not Angel of Filth. Instead, it is a man. His eyes are as dark as the night, and his hair just a few shades lighter than that. His face is lined with a neatly manicured beard, accented with a five o’clock shadow for styling purposes. He is wearing a black overcoat and clothes that match. And not to mention this dude is tall as fuck. He has his hands at his side, but I still feel captivated. He continues to stare at me with a thousand words flooding my mind. But all he says is simple.
Man: You called?
I knew I called, but not for this guy. I mean, who the hell is he even?
Man: I am the Angel of Destruction, Azrael. I heard your cries and I came.
Again. What? I stare at him and his face is void of all emotion. He just looks back at me, expecting me to say something.
Azrael: Any time is fine. Time means nothing to me.
Me: Who are you?
Azrael: While time means nothing to me, my knack for repeating myself is an utter inconvenience that will not be tolerated. It’s rude, quite frankly.
Other than the words coming from his mouth, I would never know that he was pissed off at me. Like it was no effort at all, he reaches his hand out to the side and two of the outdoor lounge chairs come scraping from across the rooftop deck, and it practically takes me right off my feet and I fall into it. He sits down calmly and in a way that just don’t look all that comfortable. Once I take it all in, I start to talk.
Me: I guess I’m just confused because I was not trying to call to you. I was trying to get to my friend who can’t be here with me right now.
Azrael: Is this not what human telephones are for?
How did I put this to someone who is an angel, or at least thinks they’re an angel. One that takes themselves much more serious than the only other one that I actually know, anyway.
Me: My friend is a little… well… like you? I guess is the way to put it.
Azrael: Interesting. Which one of my brothers and sisters consorts with a human that looks like yourself? Samael?
I shrug my shoulders. I never really thought to ask Filth that kind of question. What was her real name, or her “angel name”?
Me: I call her Angel of Filth.
Azrael: Belial… Of course. He did always say he wanted to embody the feminine chaos one day. I just did not realize he had done so. @@
Filth was a “he”? That is interesting news. I stroke my chin as he continues to speak.
Azrael: Keep your friends close and your enemies closer her always did say. I preferred to keep them all at a distance. Belial enjoys watching the torment where I regret it each time. But as all fallen’s are cursed, I must live through this horror, day in and day out, in an endless stream of time.
Me: Belial sounds so familiar. I can’t lie, I ain’t spent a lot of time reading up on my bible and shit. But I know that name.
Azrael: If you follow that perverted text of lies and blasphemy, then you probably know Belial as The Devil. The one of temptation, destruction, death, guard of the underworld, the ultimate bad guy. It just intrigues me as to what he sees in you of all people.
That can’t be seen as any kind of a compliment. Not to mention that my best friend and part time lover was the devil. That can’t be doing me any good on earning points to head into heaven.
Azrael: It’s actually the Summerlands. The oldest religion has that right. There are just a lot of blank spots due to Father’s own confusion of the tongue's tantrum. How dare his favorite creation ever attempt for a second time to gain complete knowledge. Instead of opening up the ground and sending them to the darkest pits they had ever seen as he did with his first children who disobeyed him, he just gave your blissful ignorance.
Me: Well that sucks to be y’all then I guess.
Azrael: It does indeed suck rather hard. But complaints of fairness belong to humans, because they have not had aeons to learn how their “God” works, let alone to just accept it. But something tells me that you don’t wish to hear about inequities.
I shake my head. Partially because I don’t exactly know what he means by that. But also because I did not want to discuss the spiritual universe with the Angel of Destruction and Chaos. It’s not normal, I know, but I need guidance right now.
Azrael: Fear is a hindrance. Due to your own mortality, you are prone to fear. Us eternal beings do not need to fear. We think rationally. We see challenges and we decide how to tackle them without fearing our demise. Why are you so afraid?
Me: Honestly? I am in this tournament with big implications for not only me, but also GRIME Wrestling. I never thought I would get as far as I have in the tournament, and now I’m just a little lost. I need direction.
Azrael show the first sign of emotion with a wicked grin. With a wave of his hand, there is a table in front of us, and cards are spread out. I can’t help but think that I already been there and done that. But there is only one hand dealt in front of Azrael.
Azrael: Of all things to worry about, you worry about being good enough to have made it this far in a trivial tournament put on for their entertainment of the people who feel are below you? Humans are so paradoxical.
Me: It’s not even like that though. I am better than the people who are throwing their stupid money at all of us. I know that. But they will throw more and more money at me the further I get in this tournament. And if me and Kate win the tournament, I get a shot at the biggest title in my group of brands, and I get to take on a guy whose career was a lot like mines. There just so much on the line, and with all this shit going on in the world right now, I just can’t figure out how to promote myself and how to train the way I normally train. Underneath all this ink and head grease, I’m kinda shook.
Azrael looks at his cards and guards them from me at first. He shakes his head a couple of times until waving his hand over the cards and making them appear as he wants them to.
Azrael: There is a song that has gone through your head a few times. It carries an important message. “Fortune Favours the Bold”. It was put into your life for a reason.
Me: Ain’t that the theme music of that bitch with the long legs who fucking sucks at cooking? Runs around with that cheap Holly Wood get up? I mean that one don’t even try to hide the D like Holly does.
Azrael: Have you ever sat there and thought to yourself that some cute, sweet, naive little girl is so out of place coming out to a song like that? That was your first clue. That is how cosmic messages are passed along. Whenever something seems out of place, it is usually a message.
Azrael carefully pulls one of his cards from his hand and he places it upon the table. It is a King of Diamonds.
Azrael: It makes sense that you have not heard it before now, because you were always a bold person. At least I am learning as I comb through your thoughts. You really do think a lot of yourself. But you have had reason to until lately. You were always a champion, even before you got a leather strap around your waist.
Me: You damn right I was. Why should I wait my turn when I could just carry myself like I am the best? Eventually I was the best. Real talk. I didn’t need a belt to be a champion because I was born one.
Azrael puts down a Kind of Clubs and turns it around for me to look right at. I study the card and think about everything the card stands for.
Azrael: If you don’t need a belt, then why do you doubt yourself? When you lost that World Nightmare belt, you lost your championship status. Especially in your mind. You fear and your fear causes you to lose confidence. With an abundance of fear and a lack of confidence, you are doomed to always worrying when your time will be up. That is why you will never be eternal. It is why you will never win this tournament that is so strangely important to you. It is why you will never get to move along to face Ben Jordan for the SCW World Heavyweight Championship.
Me: So what you’re saying here is that I am good enough to win this tournament and the World Heavyweight Championship?
Azrael puts down the next card and pushes it in my direction while he twists it around to face me. It is a Joker card. He makes sure I’m looking at it before putting a smile on his face once more.
Azrael: No. You are not good enough. There is no way in heaven that you will make it to that goal. You’re on borrowed time. You are basically being carried by your partner, Kate. She can only carry you for so long before she crumbles to the pressure. Each team you face will be more and more difficult. If you win, it won’t be because you’re good enough. Therefore, you will never defeat Ben Jordan.
Me: Then what was that whole thing about me being a champion without a belt? Getting my hopes all up and shit.
Azrael puts down another card, the Ace of Spades. He puts it over the Joker card and taps on it.
Azrael: You are not good enough right now, as you are. You can be good enough, though.
Me: It’s like a Disney fairytale, right? I just gotta believe in myself. Find my true love to break the curse of self doubt. Sing a feminist power ballad. Whistle to some birds.
Azrael: You do not need to do any of that. Except believe in yourself. The rest just seems silly to me. I don’t understand what whistling at birds would do to help you accomplish your dreams.
Now it was my turn to feel smarter than this one. He was all confused and laughing at me like I was the idiot. It’s like he don’t understand sarcasm or some shit. Okay, okay.
Azrael: Most of us don’t care much for sarcasm. It serves no real purpose. But it makes sense that Belial chose you because that is one of his favorite human characteristics. You really do continue to remind me of Belial. It is no wonder he enjoys degradative sexual acts with you.
Me: What the…
Azrael taps the side of his head to remind me that he’s strapped into my mind just like it was his own catalogue of thoughts. I can’t argue with it any longer. I just accept it for what it is, and I move on. It’s not just any day that you get to sit down and talk to the Angel of Destruction. There’s just so many questions. And I start to wonder if there was a little something extra in that bit I smoked a little bit ago. I turn back to him to ask questions, and he’s just gone. Vanished into thin air like he was never there. And that was how I finally got my answers, and I knew what I needed to do next. I head back to my room to get a mask ready to deliver, because part of this whole journey of Blast From the Past is to learn to work as a team instead of being two unengaged flaccid egos.
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G.eneral R.eminders I.nciting M.ass E.mergence
Saxon Luxury Hotel; Las Vegas, NV
Wednesday March 25th, 2020
The sun is shining down through the glass windows just above the pool and it sparkles off of the water. It smells like rich people up in this bitch too. I mean that like it be smelling like money and expensive perfume and colognes, but also it don’t be smelling like bleach chlorine up in here. They be doing that rich people salt water shit. Like I can actually breathe in here. I ain’t choking on mediocrity and shit. It don’t make it any worse that I’m sitting here looking at this blonde chick standing in front of me in a pink bathing suit, with a pink GRIME mask in her hands neither. But then I remember it’s Kate Steele, and start listening to what she’s saying again, and that appeal goes out the window, chicos.
Kate: Come on pumpkin it’s time to get dried up. We are going to spend some time with Auntie Melody! We are going to have ourselves a MAKEUP day and maybe drive James to the brink of insanity as we do it. Let’s go have some fun shall we?!
As Kate and her daughter Julie or whatever go rushing off to get they hair and nails did to get ready for our match on Sunday, I start thinking Filth might have my balls for this move. Whatever. I stand by it. And I better get used to calling her Pink. I can hear that fucking bubbly laughter all the way across the pool as they leave the door. That’s when Yellow comes walking up to me. He’s bold, and he’s showing a lot of commitment in his yellow mask, black mask, and nothing else?
Yellow: Guten tag Herr Gonzalez.
Me: Yo, hombre. Wha’s poppin’?
Yellow looks at me for a second like he’s confused. I can’t help but laugh at the language barrier. I put an arm around him and he is quick to push me off like we been brothers for years now.
Yellow: Don’t do all of that. You might tempt me into doing something right here at poolside.
Me: Yeah, there’s kids up around here. You might wanna put that away before you get the cops called on you.
Again with that strange look.
Yellow: Die Polizei? Why for? This is completely normal back home.
Me: I’m all about admiring the naked bodies of all humans over the age of 18, 17 in some states, but that shit ain’t cool when kids is around, daag.
Yellow sighs and walks over to a lounge chair and he pulls on a yellow Speedo but it’s not that much better. At least it will stop him from getting the police called on him and most likely being unmasked in front of everyone too early. He comes back over to me and stares at me from behind those yellow “X” eyes in front of the mask.
Yellow: This is uncomfortable for me.
Me: But trust when I say that it’s much more comfortable for almost everybody else.
Yellow gives a single nod of the head and moves to the lounge to bask in the sunlight while I just sit down casually in the lounger next to him. After a second, I spread out and get comfortable.
Yellow: Are you nervous at all? We could work this out in the gym maybe?
Me: Nah, not really. I had an interesting talk with an angel a couple days ago and I got a whole new outlook on this whole tournament. If I’m acting like I’m anything less than a champion, then I will never be a champion. I shoulda learned that while I was under the Ahuevo mask but I didn’t. I gotta think like I’m the one to beat so that I will be.
Yellow: This is mind over matter, yes?
I nod my head and reach over for a high five. I never really sat down to talk to Yellow before so this was all new to me. He might actually be someone to listen to around GRIME.
Me: More or less. So I just gotta work on the psychology of the match more than getting my fitness in. The best way for me to do that is to talk some trash. As a matter of fact…
I whistle out loud as I spot “Stoner” Scott Oliver from across the pool. I made a purchase from him a couple days ago and it was well worth the money, so I figure we was cool to get this going. He points to himself and I wave him over to me. He gets up and walks around the pool to come to me.
Me: Yo, Scott, you got a minute to shoot the shit wit me, mang?
Scott: It would be like the first time that I ever did an interview in my swimsuit. I could go to my room and get dressed up, get a cameraman and…
Me: No, no. I got my own camera here. I ain’t give a fuck what you dressed in. I got some stuff on my mind and it’s driving me loco, vato. I just need to get it off my chest, you know what I mean? Of course you do.
Scott nods his head but he looks around. He don’t see the drone camera that’s filming me right now because it’s quiet and out of sight. It’s obvious that he don’t really know what I’m talking about but he goes with it anyway. I slap his shoulder as I sit back up sideways in the lounger and clasp my hands together.
Scott: What can I help you with today? Like I wasn’t prepared for an interview so I don’t have much in the way to ask.
Me: Get that interviewer hat on and start thinkin’, gringo.
Scott: Ohhh, they don’t give us hats or anything. We just come up with our questions from the top of our head or from this paper that they give us.
I blink because he can’t really be serious. Can he? I mean, them white boys don’t always be knowing how to handle their shit, so maybe he’s just way too blasted right now.
Me: Lemme get you up to speed here, brother. I’m Javier Gonzalez. You knew that, right?
Again he nods, but with more conviction. But it’s still obvious that he don’t know me from the vatos working the streets in they district downtown.
Me: And ain’t nobody in SCW, SCU, or even GRIME Wrestling thought it was a chance I would ever come up from round one to round three of Blast From the Past Tournament. Especially with the ever indecisive Kate Steele as my partner.
Scott: OHHHH! I thought her partner was the guy that used to be Ahuevo. You know, the guy whose hair was insured for like $100,000 and he wore suits and shit. He used to run around with Tim Staggs, and was the Underworld Champion or something.
Me: That’s me. Javier Gonzalez.
Scott and this confused look is already on my damn nerves right now. I can’t even stand it right now. So I ignore his idiotic questions and make a mental note never to do this with him ever again.
Me: We made it past two teams so far. Nobody thought we was gonna go by Dani Weston and Dmitri, but we put them on notice. Then it was Bill Barnhart and Andrea Hernandez. They think we got lucky for a second time. Ain’t no way we could get lucky going against Austin James Mercer, your Internet Champion, or Candy, your Bombshell Roulette Champion. Keep on doubting, because your hate fuels me to do better.
I pat my chest to add emphasis to what I’m saying. Doubt all you want, but I’m gonna rise above, holms. It’s how we do it, I think to myself.
Me: But I ain’t gonna tell Kate to end Candy. I ain’t gonna end AJM. I like chaos and destruction, but truth is that I understand business. My beef is with SCU, not SCW. I understand that business will go on as usual as far as matches go. So I gotta leave something for Bea Barnhart, since I ain’t left much of her husband for her. It’s my olive branch to you, Bea.
Scott: Oh, I got a question!
Me: And I’m bored with you, so you can go before I decide to make us look like face twins.
Scott sees all the tattoos on my face and that is more than enough motivation for him to step off. All while Yellow laughs a hearty laugh at Scott.
Me: So Candy, please feel free to get ready to defend your title against Bea Barnhart. Don’t even get your hopes up for defending the belt against either Evie or Sierra, because that’s just not in the cards for you.
Since I’m running out of storage space on my card now, because I always forget to clear the shit, I know I need to go for the throat.
Me: Now let’s talk about you, Mr. Champ. You got a target on your back for all of SCW. SCU wants to work they way up to facing you one day. GRIME got they plates full right now. But there is one vato you gotta keep your eyes open for. And you looking right at him. But it ain’t even your belt I’m after. It’s just a damn good thing that the belt ain’t on the line because I promise you I would be leaving Staggs Dungeon with it over my shoulder.
Damn right.
Me: Truth is that you are nothing more to me than a means to an end. Even making it to the finals, winning the trophies with GRIME Member Pink at my side, it’s not about any of that. It’s not even about facing Ben Jordan at Summer XXXTreme. Though don’t forgot my history, because you was there on the cruise ship for Supernova 2 when I won two belts. That cruise ship is my good luck charm. I will win that belt.
And everybody knows it.
Me: But it’s not about all that. It’s about showing the world that GRIME is a fucking threat. Right now, people think we just some masked hoods runnin’ around stirring up shit for laughs. Yeah, we laugh real fucking hard, but we are our own company, with our own owner, and our own GM, and our own leaders. Austin, you way above SCU and you stated it I don’t know how many times. So tell me how it gonna look when you fall to the Javi Bux? How’s it gone look when I become the first from an outside company to win this tournament and the title? Pretty damn good for GRIME. See you all on Sunday, and get ready to get bucked.
Yellow: That was fucking awesome, brother…
I smirk and nod but that’s it. My smiling face, shining in the natural light and the waves of the fancy salt water pool. That’s all you see until it all fades out.
